Romancham

Romancham (transl.Goosebumps) is a 2023 Indian Malayalam-language comedy horror film written and directed by Jithu Madhavan in his directorial debut. Based on a real life incident, it stars Soubin Shahir, Arjun Ashokan, Sajin Gopu, Siju Sunny, Abin Bino and Anantharaman Ajay.[5] Set in Bangalore, the plot revolves around seven unmarried men who, out of boredom, use an Ouija board and the subsequent events that follow.

Romancham
Directed byJithu Madhavan
Written byJithu Madhavan
Produced by
Starring
CinematographySanu Thahir
Edited byKiran Das
Music bySushin Shyam
Release date
  • 3 February 2023 (2023-02-03)[1]
Running time
129 minutes[2]
CountryIndia
LanguageMalayalam
Box office68−70 crore (US$−8.8 million)[3][4]

Romancham received positive reviews from the critics,[6] emerging as a sleeper hit at the box office grossing ₹70 crore worldwide and becoming the highest-grossing Malayalam film of the year until it was surpassed by 2018.[7] It is currently one of the highest-grossing Malayalam films.[8]

Plot

2007: Jibin Madhavan (Soubin Shahir) partially wakes up in the ICU of a hospital in Bangalore when he is told that he has been suffering from meningitis for a week. This is the first time he has regained consciousness, and he is told that no visitors are allowed to meet him because of his condition. Jibin insists on meeting his friends or being moved to another room, but the doctor makes it clear that unless his vision improves, he will not be moved out of the ICU. Jibin is desperate to meet his friends as if he wants to convey something important to them. He tries to trick the on-duty nursew into letting him move into the room, but she refuses to fall for his antics. Jibin seems very restless, and he is insistent on wanting to meet his friends at the earliest. The nurse is curious to know what exactly must be the reason, and that's when Jibin recalls his tale of encountering the unseen in the past few weeks.

Seven of them live on the outskirts of the city, trying to make a decent life. Jibin, Rivin (Anantharaman Ajay), Niroop (Sajin Gopu), Shijappan (Abin Bino), Mukesh (Siju Sunny), Karikuttan (Afzal PH), and Soman (Jagadeesh Kumar) are the residents of the house and are trying to make their lives bearable. Out of all of them, only Rivin and Karikuttan have full-time jobs; the rest are just trying to scrape by, while Niroop is waiting for an appointment letter from an IT company, something he hopes would change his life for the better.

The boys always resort to playing Volleyball in the evening, which Jibin resents as he does not know how to play the game. One day, out of spite, he deflated the ball and headed to a friend's place. At his friend's place, he sees a group conducting a séance using an Ouija board in the hope of finding a soul they can talk to. Realizing this is something the group can do at home as a group activity, he brings a carrom board and creates the atmosphere for a séance. The group decides to agree with Jibin's idea of making the evening all the more fun.

Rivin, being the religious one of the lot, refuses to be a part of something as sinister as Ouija, which he claims is anti-Christ. After keeping him out of the Ouija board activity, the men began their quest to find out if the spirits would come down and answer their questions. As they begin their séance, Jibin realizes no spirit has come down to move the glass on the board, and he and one of his roommates, Shijappan, start moving the glass on their own to make the rest of them believe that the séance is working.

As the séance progresses, they start asking questions. Jibin and Shijappan come up with the name Anamika, which makes the rest of them believe that the spirit is a woman, and they continue asking her various questions, to which Anamika starts giving the right answers. Answers of which, technically, only Jibin and Shijappan are aware. Their séance part becomes popular among their friends. On one occasion, their friends asked a question about the pet cat. Anamika ends up having the right answer, which puts Jibin and Shijappan on the back foot and wondering if the spirit has descended into their homes.

Unfortunately for all of them, Anamika predicted a person named Matthew would die. They check up on their friend Matthew, but thankfully nothing happens to him. But their neighbor's father, who was also named Matthew, passes away, making the boys wonder if they should continue playing this game after all. Even Rivin admits that he has been having blackouts and losing a sense of direction while heading home from work. Rivin, too, starts experiencing something odd happening at home since they began their séance activity. They bring their friend, who is an expert in the game, but things go south with him as well. Niroop, being the sole decision-maker at home, decides to end the nuisance once and for all, which all of them oblige to. These people are tired of seeing the negative impact of playing Ouija at home and bringing Anamika into their lives. They want to get done with all the weird and bad things that have been going on like the constant fights between them and Rivin's conscious mind getting affected. Getting rid of the board was the only apparent solution.

But now that this one nuisance is gone, Jibin's friend Sinu Solomon (Arjun Ashokan) comes by to live with them, because recently, he has been through an episode that no one in the family can sort out. To give him a change of scenery, they ask Jibin to make sure Sinu stays with them for a while. Sinu is a simple boy who is close to Jibin. But as his stay begins, Sinu starts exhibiting weird behaviors including staring at a wall until he is physically shaken and speaking to someone in the middle of the night. Jibin and his friends start noticing his weird behavior, and they maintain a distance from him. Sinu is politely asked by Jibin to leave their home, and he agrees to do the same.

With Sinu gone, Anamika's spirit starts wrecking their home as many unnatural and unexpected things start happening again. Rivin again starts forgetting the way back home, and Karikuttan ends up losing his job at the petrol pump because, absentmindedly, he ends up filling someone's petrol tank with diesel. Karikuttan also does not know what made him blank out and make a silly mistake that cost him his job. These incidents kind of start taking a toll on everyone at home, and they are sure there has been something off about them since the Ouija board games they started playing. All of them lose their minds and try to leave their home as soon as possible. Jibin, on the other hand, just out of pure worry, ends up suffering from an extreme fever, which develops into meningitis.

Jibin ends up in the hospital because of the illness, and he is soon shifted to a room after showing signs of recovery. He informs the nurse that while going unconscious due to his fever, the last thing he saw was the spirit of a woman getting into his bag. The last scene of “Romancham” has Jibin asking his friends to get hold of the bag, and that is when he is informed that Sinu is back in town to help Jibin with his recovery, and he will be getting the bag for him. Because Jibin had a very high fever, there was a chance he hallucinated something before becoming unconscious. There is no surety that Anamika exists in the home for them to be triggered about. Or even if she existed, her power would have been neutralized by Sinu's presence at home. The men hardly went through any major incidents during the duration of Sinu's stay at their homes.

Cast

  • Soubin Shahir as Jibin Madhavan
  • Arjun Ashokan as Sinu Solomon
  • Sajin Gopu as Niroop
  • Abin Bino as Shijappan
  • Siju Sunny as Mukesh
  • Anantharaman Ajay as Rivin
  • Afzal PH as Hari (Karikuttan)
  • Jagadeesh Kumar as Nithin Naarayan (Soman)
  • Joemon Jyothir as DJ Babu
  • Chemban Vinod Jose as Sayed (cameo role)
  • Deepika Siva as Nurse Nayana
  • Sneha Matthew as Pooja
  • Asim Jamal as Benny
  • Thankam Mohan
  • Jolly Chirayath as Sinu's mother

Production

Development

Romancham was produced by John Paul George and Girish Gangadharan under the banner Guppy Cinemas. Jithu Madhavan who has previously worked as an assistant director in the films Utopiayile Rajavu, Guppy, Maradona and Ambili was chosen to direct the film that marked his directorial debut. Jithu Madhavan revealed that the film is based on his personal experience. He stated that despite being frightening at the time, it now seems amusing after all these years.[9] Listin Stephen was approached to produce the film. However, he decided not to produce it since he didn’t like the story of Romancham.[10]

Casting

Soubin was the first actor cast to play one of the lead roles. Most of the actors in the film were not mainstream actors. They were chosen due to their popularity in other media such as TikTok, reels, and web series, each of them was selected without any prior audition and Arjun Ashokan joined the cast then.[11]

Music

Romancham
Soundtrack album by
Released2023
Recorded2022-2023 (2022-2023)
GenreFeature film soundtrack
Length20:10
LanguageMalayalam
LabelSaregama
ProducerSushin Shyam
Sushin Shyam chronology
Ariyippu
(2023)
Romancham
(2023)

All lyrics are written by Vinayak Sasikumar; all music is composed by Sushin Shyam

No.TitleArtist(s)Length
1."Aadharanjali"Sushin Shyam
Madhuvanthi Narayan
2:29
2."Athmave Poo"Sushin Shyam3:36
3."Manuja"Rex Vijayan
Sushin Shyam
3:29
4."Thalatherichavar"Zia Ul Haq
MC Couper
Sushin Shyam
4:21
5."Ottamuri Vakkumayi"Pradeep Kumar
Sushin Shyam
3:28
6."Romancham Title Track"Neha Nair
Sushin Shyam
2:45
Total length:20:10

Release

Romancham was released on 3 February 2023[1] across 144 theatres in Kerala.

Home Media

Romancham was released on Disney+Hotstar on April 7, 2023 and it was available Malayalam, Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu from April 17,2023.[12]

Reception

Critical response

Gopika of The Times of India gave 4 out of 5 stars and wrote "Romancham is the movie that gives us this wonderful formula. There is no exaggeration, no nonsensical humour, the movie is simply hilarious and interestingly, it's inspired from real life incidents."[1] S. R. Praveen of The Hindu wrote "Along with some top-notch comic performances from the entire cast, everything works like a charm and evokes uproarious laughter in director Jithu Madhavan's debut film."[13]

Cris of The News Minute gave 4 out of 5 stars.[14] Sajin Shirjith of The New Indian Express gave 4 out of 5 stars and wrote "Romancham is at its funniest when it explores the idiosyncrasies of its well-sketched character."[15]

Box Office

Romancham grossed ₹4.35 crore in its first four days.[16] It grossed ₹25 crore in 11 days with ₹17 crore from Kerala box office.[17] The film collected ₹50 crore in 23 days with ₹30 crore from Kerala, ₹17 crore from overseas and ₹3 crore from other parts of India.[18][19] Romancham grossed ₹62 crore in 34 days collecting ₹38 crore from Kerala, ₹21.15 crore from overseas market and ₹3.6 crore from other parts of India.[20][21] It grossed ₹64 crore in 38 days grossing ₹39.35 crore from Kerala, ₹3.8 crore from other parts of India and ₹22 crore from overseas.[22][23]

Romancham grossed over ₹68 crore after 50 days of its theatrical run by collecting ₹41 crore from Kerala, ₹4.1 crore from other parts of India and ₹22.9 crore from overseas market.[7][24]

Sequel

The film ends with a hint of a possible sequel in the future. The director has stated that a sequel will only be pursued if the script can match the quality of Romancham, and that they will not proceed with the sequel for the sake of it.[25]

References

  1. "Romancham Movie Review: Exactly what you need to cheer up". The Times of India. 7 February 2023. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  2. "Romancham (2023)". Irish Film Classification Office. Retrieved 17 February 2023.
  3. "50-ാം ദിവസവും കേരളത്തിലെ 107 തിയറ്ററുകളില്‍! 'രോമാഞ്ചം' ഇതുവരെ നേടിയത്". www.asianetnews.com.
  4. "2018 box office collection Day 3: Jude Anthany Joseph film marches ahead breaking all records, rakes in Rs 4.01 cr on Sunday". 8 May 2023.
  5. ഈ സിനിമയ്ക്കായി ജീവിതവും കരിയറുമെല്ലാം പണയത്തിലായി: രോമാഞ്ചം നിർമാതാവ് ജോൺപോൾ പറയുന്നു [Life and career on the line for this film: Says Romancham producer John Paul]. Malayala Manorama (in Malayalam).
  6. "'Romancham': Reason why the film is a unique horror thriller in Mollywood". The Times of India. ISSN 0971-8257. Retrieved 22 September 2023.
  7. "50-ാം ദിവസവും കേരളത്തിലെ 107 തിയറ്ററുകളില്‍! 'രോമാഞ്ചം' ഇതുവരെ നേടിയത്". www.asianetnews.com. Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  8. "'2018' to 'Pulimurugan': Highest grossing movies at Kerala box office". timesofindia.indiatimes.com. Retrieved 17 September 2023.
  9. "'Romancham' OTT Release: Here's when and where to watch Jithu Madhavan's horror comedy". The Economic Times. 29 March 2023. ISSN 0013-0389. Retrieved 22 September 2023.
  10. "Producer Listin Stephen admits that he made a mistake not backing Romancham". OTTPlay. Retrieved 22 September 2023.
  11. Anand, Shilpa Nair (18 February 2023). "'Romancham' is based on a real-life incident that I experienced: Malayalam director Jithu Madhavan". The Hindu. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 17 September 2023.
  12. "'Romancham' OTT: Soubin Shahir's horror comedy to start streaming on THIS date". The Times of India. 5 April 2023. ISSN 0971-8257. Retrieved 22 September 2023.
  13. Praveen, S. R. (4 February 2023). "Romancham' movie review: Jithu Madhavan's horror-comedy is a laugh riot". The Hindu. Archived from the original on 4 February 2023. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  14. "Romancham review: Great debuts make this Soubin horror comedy a fun watch". The News Minute. 4 February 2023. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  15. "'Romancham' Malayalam film review: Rewarding horror-comedy high on laughs". The New Indian Express. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
  16. "ബോക്സ് ഓഫീസിലും ചിരിക്കിലുക്കം; കളക്ഷനില്‍ കുതിപ്പുമായി 'രോമാഞ്ചം'". www.asianetnews.com. Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  17. "Romancham Movie Kerala Box Office Original Collection Reports in 11 Days | ആത്മാവിനെ കാണാൻ ജനസാഗരം; കളക്ഷൻ കണ്ട് രോമാഞ്ചം| Movies News in Malayalam". zeenews.india.com. Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  18. "23 ദിവസത്തിൽ 50 കോടി; പണം വാരി രോമാഞ്ചം; റിപ്പോർട്ട്". www.manoramanews.com. Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  19. "Romancham movie box office soubin arjun ashokan starrer movie 30 days box office collection | Romancham Movie: 30 ദിവസം പിന്നിട്ട് രോമാ‍ഞ്ചം; ബോക്സ് ഓഫീസ് കുതിപ്പ് തുടരുന്നു | Movies News in Malayalam". zeenews.india.com. Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  20. "'രോമാഞ്ചം' ഈ വര്‍ഷത്തെ ആദ്യ ബോക്സ് ഓഫീസ് ഹിറ്റ്; ഒരു മാസത്തെ കളക്ഷന്‍ ഇങ്ങനെ". News18 Malayalam (in Malayalam). Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  21. "ബോക്സ് ഓഫീസില്‍ ഫുള്‍ സ്റ്റോപ്പ് ഇല്ലാതെ 'രോമാഞ്ചം'; ഒരു മാസം കൊണ്ട് നേടിയത്". www.asianetnews.com. Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  22. "Romancham Movie Box Office Total Gross Collection Reaches 65 Crore Malayalam Horror Comedy Film Expected to Streaming in Disney Plus Hotstar Very Soon | Romancham Box Office : ബോക്സ് ഓഫീസിലും രോമാഞ്ചിഫിക്കേഷൻ; രോമഞ്ചത്തിന്റെ ആകെ കളക്ഷൻ ഇത്ര | Movies News in Malayalam". zeenews.india.com. Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  23. ijas (13 March 2023). "ബോക്സ് ഓഫീസ് 'പൊതപ്പിച്ചു'; രോമാഞ്ചം ഇതുവരെ നേടിയത് 64 കോടി". Media One. Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  24. "Romancham | 50 കോടി നേടി, 107 തിയേറ്ററുകളിൽ 50 ദിവസം ഓടി; രോമാഞ്ചിഫിക്കേഷൻ നൽകി 'രോമാഞ്ചം'". News18 Malayalam (in Malayalam). Retrieved 17 October 2023.
  25. "Romancham director Jithu Madhavan on sequel plans: ‘We have an ending in mind but will go ahead only…’". OTT Play. 20 February 2023. Retrieved 3 May 2023.
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